Nielsen had an interesting blog on Wednesday about an uptick in music sales but they also point out that the mainly ignored genre of Rock is still the most popular style of music, with 32 percent album share, while pop music represents 40 percent of all current digital tracks sold. Here is an excerpt from the blog: Music sales in the U.S. are up 1.6 percent in 2011, according to The Nielsen Company, as digital album and track sales saw dramatic growth through May 8.
While physical albums saw a decline in year-over-year sales from the same period in 2010, digital album and track purchases went up 16.8 percent and 9.6 percent, respectively. Digital retailers received more than half of all music transactions, propelling a 12.4 percent growth in sales over last year.
Catalog album sales are up 5.4 percent in 2011, thanks in part to a long-awaited 2010 deal allowing digital distribution of The Beatles' albums for the first time. Read more here
